


You Deserve Love

by boredom



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Aziraphale (Good Omens), Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Oblivious Aziraphale (Good Omens), Panic Attacks, Pining Crowley (Good Omens), Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-17 21:48:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19963726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boredom/pseuds/boredom
Summary: Aziraphale has never felt loved. At least, not in the way he wants. After the apocalypse, things come to a head and Crowley is left to pick up the pieces.





	You Deserve Love

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think I've ever been in such an active fandom before. It's kind of weird and I'm kind of liking it. My longer GO Fic will update soon, I promise, just ironing out some kinks. Until then, enjoy!

Aziraphale was a being of love. As an angel, he was designed to love all of God’s creatures and he took to that duty with relish and zeal. He loved love. He could sense it in Adam and Eve, their protectiveness over one another, their desire to make the other happy. While it was true that love could make people do horrible things, love could also make them do wonderful and selfless things. 

He loved this. He loved seeing a father give his kidney up for his daughter so that she may live. He loved seeing a friend comfort their friend after a bad breakup, despite the fact that they weren’t getting anything out of listening to them cry for hours about a partner who was not that great to begin with. He loved seeing lovers run and leap into each other's arms after not seeing one another for months. He loved love in all of its forms. 

Despite this love of love, when it came to experiencing love, Aziraphale distanced himself from it. He knew the other angels loved him, but it was a cold and distant sort of love. It was similar to how humans loved grass. They loved how it made their lawns look, as long as it was all proper and neat and uniform. If it was too long, too dry, or a different type, they’d get rid of it. Snuff it out to return to the uniformed lawn look. The angels loved Aziraphale, but if he didn’t conform, they could and would get rid of him. 

Crowley didn’t love him. Aziraphale would have been able to tell, but ever since their first meeting at the Garden, Crowley’s feelings for him had not changed. More than once Aziraphale had angrily bitten out that Crowley was a demon and therefore incapable of love. He always felt guilty afterwards. He didn’t know if demons were incapable of love. Crowley was also under no obligation to love him in any way, shape, or form. It was selfish for Aziraphale to demand it of him. 

He also kept his distance from humans. They had such short lives and it wouldn’t do to get attached. He broke this rule only once. 

It was after Crowley and he had argued about the Holy Water. Crowley had disappeared and Aziraphale had decided to focus on his work (as an angel, not as a bookseller, good Heavens!). 

He was doing the usual round of miracles and blessings when he came upon a young man with such passionate stories to tell. Despite his mind screaming at him that this was a bad idea, that it would only end in pain, he decided to pursue the relationship. 

Oscar died on November 30, 1900. 

Aziraphale had wrapped his wings tightly around himself and wailed. It was only as he was sobbing, curled in the corner of his bookshop, that he realized the sad truth. 

Oscar was the only one who had loved him unconditionally. He was also the only one who had ever hugged him. Only once, and only to assure him not to worry about the trial. 

He wondered if God was punishing him. She had punished others over less. Perhaps Aziraphale had grown too greedy, too sinful and she decided it would be best to remind him that Angels were supposed to love, not to be loved. He decided it would be best to return to an aloof, almost unseen presence in the world. It was time to be the perfect angel he was expected to be. 

Crowley showed up again not long after. The blitz had made Aziraphale question if Crowley perhaps could really love him. He shut the thought down as quickly as it had cropped up. Even if Crowley had somehow spontaneously gained a sense of affection for Aziraphale, it would no doubt end in pain for both of them. 

He was meant to love, not to be loved. 

When he ate, he could almost pretend that someone loved him. The chefs put so much care into their food. When he ate it, it was almost as if they were putting in care specifically for him. 

He started cataloguing every friendly touch that he had ever received. Crowley’s hand brushing against his when handing him the bill after arguing about the legality of dining and dashing. Another rare-book dealer selling Aziraphale a copy he had yet to find, patting him on the back as he walked out the door. A child bumping into him as they chased a butterfly. All these touches burned and he felt pathetic for wanting more. 

He kept reminding himself, he was meant to love, not to be loved. And at least he still had the angels. Sure, they loved him like humans loved grass, but love was love. He was pathetic for wanting more. 

It all came to a head approximately three weeks after the failed Armageddon. Aziraphale and Crowley were drinking in the back room of the bookshop. They were several bottle in and Crowley was telling him about some interesting adventures he had as a pirate.

Aziraphale realized now that Heaven had effectively disowned him, no one loved him. 

oOoOoOo

Crowley thought everything was going rather well. There was no sign from their ex-bosses. The world was still turning. Neither of them had been smited by God, yet. Yeah, things were going great. 

He was telling Aziraphale a rather funny story involving a llama on Blackbeard’s ship when the angel burst into tears. 

Now, Crowley had known Aziraphale for a long time and he had seen him cry before. Once. At a nature documentary about penguins. 

This was nothing like that time. 

“Ah, don’t worry, Angel!” He put down his wine glass and waved his hands helplessly. “The llama was fine, don’t worry. I got it back to Peru, no problem.” 

Aziraphale started sobbing harder. He probably wasn’t crying about the llama, then. But what was he crying about? What could have possibly happened?

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Crowley wasn’t very good at comforting people. He always left when people started to cry and overly emotional parts of movies made him uncomfortable. 

It had nothing to do with the fact that he was a demon. It had all to do with the fact that he had spent so long in Britain that most overt displays of emotion made him react in a British way: discomfort and confusion. 

Aziraphale was still sobbing and was starting to talk about grass of all things. 

“Why do we have to get rid of crabgrass? It’s just doing what it was made to do.” 

“What?” This was an extreme reaction over grass. He didn’t even cry this hard when the baby penguins were in danger. 

“It’s not perfect so humans get rid of it. They have no right to decide what’s perfect and what isn’t. Their lawns would be beautiful even if it was entirely made of crabgrass.” 

Maybe Crowley had been too quick to assume Heaven and Hell would leave them alone. Maybe this was his punishment, dealing with an inconsolable angel who was having a crisis over crabgrass. 

“And I don’t even think Sargent Shadwell counts as a hug because I was in Madam Tracy’s body and he was just clinging because he was scared and how pathetic am I to debate whether or not that was a hug?” 

Crowley swallowed his pride and slid next to Aziraphale. 

“Angel, breath, it’s okay. We can figure this out.” He was hoping he would calm down as Crowley didn’t know what Sargent Shadwell and Madam Tracy had to do with crabgrass. 

“Oh, God!” Aziraphale shrieked. 

Crowley hissed as the air turned more holy. 

“Oh, God, Sargent Shadwell’s going to die now and it’s all my fault.” His breathing was coming out in short, stuttered breaths. 

“Aziraphale, you don’t need to breath, remember, calm down,” Crowley said, though he himself was panicking. It was one thing to be crying over crabgrass. He thought he could deal with this… probably. It was quite another thing for Aziraphale to start having a panic attack. 

“Sargent Shadwell isn’t going to die because of you. Why would you think that?” 

Crowley had a habit of making things worse for himself. This was one such time. 

“Oscar.” Aziraphale managed to gasp out. Then he was gone. Well, not physically gone but he was past the point of reasoning. He was in a full-blown panic attack now and Crowley was terrified that if he didn’t do something Aziraphale would die, this time for real. 

“Angel, angel, calm down.” He knew from experience that telling people to calm down never worked. It was instinct. It was a bad instinct. 

Aziraphale started clutching and clawing at his collar. With a snap, Crowley made the bowtie disappear and popped off several buttons. Aziraphale would probably give him an earful later, but right now he could care less. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know how to help. 

He searched the depths of his mind for a solution, any solution that could help. He read somewhere about breathing techniques. Once. He couldn’t remember anything about the article but breathing slowly should help. Right?

“Aziraphale?” Crowley asked, putting an arm on his shoulder. “Can you hear me?” 

Aziraphale was still trying and failing to catch his breath and pitched sideways, sliding off the couch. It was only thanks to a quick miracle that he didn’t crack his head on the table.

He fell to his knees next to him and got smacked in the face by a large, white wing. Things were really bad if his wings were manifesting in this plane. They only really came out in times of true crisis. 

He willed himself to be calm and grabbed Aziraphale’s hand. “Come on, you can understand me, right?” 

Aziraphale looked at him, still gasping. Crowley took that as a yes. 

“Can you breathe with me? In.” He took a big, showy breath in. “Out.” 

Aziraphale tried but didn’t manage nearly as long as Crowley had. 

“That’s okay. We’ll try again. Yeah?” He put his hand on his heart and forced the organ to start beating. “Focus on my heartbeat and my voice. Let’s try again. In. Out.” 

It took several more minutes to finally get Aziraphale calm enough to where he was breathing again. Crowley felt exhausted and he could even begin to imagine how Aziraphale felt. They weren’t human, but even emotions as intense and extreme as this could wipe them out. 

A few more minutes of them sitting on the floor, breathing deeply. Aziraphale sat up and pulled his hand away from Crowley’s chest. 

“I’m sorry, my dear. That was improper of me.” He wiped his eyes and straightened out his clothes. 

Crowley gaped. Improper? He had nearly discorporated himself on the floor of his bookshop and he was worried about being improper? He forced himself to remain calm, remembering how Heaven had treated him. 

“What was that all about, angel?” 

Aziraphale laughed, tense and short. “Just me being silly. No need to worry.” 

“Please, talk to me. That wasn’t normal.” 

He smiled at him, then sighed and slumped against the couch. Whatever it was must have been bad because Crowley had never seen Aziraphale with such bad posture. 

“I guess I realized now that Heaven has disowned me, so to speak, there’s no one left.” 

“What? What are you talking about? The whole point of stopping Armageddon was that lots of people are left.” 

Aziraphale looked so tired in the dim light of the bookshop. It was the first time Crowley remembered him looking so… human. He looked like a man with years worth of burdens dropped onto his shoulders. He looked like a man ready to give up. He looked like so many souls Crowley had seen; alone, but accepting in their fate. 

“It’s not that. I realized that there is no one left who loves me.” 

Crowley was frozen at the confession. He had loved Aziraphale for so long. Ever since he saw him in the Garden cooing over the plants and animals, he had loved him. He was drawn to his light, his purity, his desire to do the right thing without questioning if it was what God wanted. He loved this angel so much it hurt sometimes. 

“You think that lot loved you?” Was what he managed to say. 

Aziraphale gave him a tired smile. It was the smile of a man who knew they were accepting horrible treatment, but weren’t going to do anything about it. 

“They love all of God’s creatures, it’s in their nature. Even if it is a clinical and detached sort of love.”

He sighed and scrubbed at his eyes again. “I can’t let another human get close to me. After I lost Oscar… it hurt too much. I put myself out there for this relationship and in what felt like the blink of an eye, I was alone again. No one stopped by and eventually I had to pick myself up because they reprimanded me for slacking.” Tears started rolling down his cheeks. “I wasn’t even allowed to grieve because I was taking too long. They have such short lives, even now. I can’t let that happen again. I can’t be the reason another human’s life is cut short.” 

“Why do you think you’re the reason he died?” Crowley asked. It was difficult to argue against logic when you didn’t know the full breadth of the logic. 

“I’m an angel. I’m not supposed to be loved. I’m only supposed to love. God was punishing me because I wanted so badly for someone to show me they cared about me. I wanted someone,” he curled in on himself, the wings wrapping around him. “I just wanted someone who loved me for me and not because of what I could do for them. I was, am so lonely, Crowley. I keep trying to do better but I can’t get myself to stop. I can’t get myself to remember every touch and pretend like it was full of love. I can’t get myself to quit leeching it off of others. I can’t and I try so hard and I can’t even blame you because you’ve never tempted me with love.” 

He was sobbing again. Crowley was worried he was going to go into another panic attack. He was also wondering how on Earth Aziraphale didn’t understand that Crowley had loved him for thousands of years. He decided the only thing to do right now was to wrap and arm around him, fluffy wings and all. This did not have the desired effect as Aziraphale started crying harder, if that was even possible. 

“What am I doing wrong? Why am I wrong? Even now I’m remembering this touch so that when I’m weak I can try and feel it again. I can try and feel something again.” 

This was not a one-armed hug situation. This called for a full on hug. So that’s what Crowley did. He wrapped his other arm around Aziraphale and squeezed him tightly, as if to try and press the broken pieces back together. 

“What about me? Why can’t you get love from me?” Crowley was almost afraid of the answer. Aziraphale had made it perfectly clear with snide comments over the years about how Crowley couldn’t feel love. 

Aziraphale pushed back and wiped his nose. “Oh, dear, I couldn’t ask that of you. I know you don’t love me, never have. To ask you to force yourself to feel an emotion, it’s too cruel. Plus I can’t lose you.” 

Crowley took a deep breath. “Look, angel, God is not punishing you for wanting love. And you are not wrong for wanting it. You’re not weak either. Opening yourself up is extremely difficult. You deserve to be loved.” 

This next part was going to be hard, but it had to be said. They had spent so long assuming things about the other and that had to stop. Open communication. That’s what all the relationship experts said. 

“I love you, Aziraphale, ever since the Garden I have loved you. I don’t know why you can’t sense that, but I’m not lying to you. I have never lied to you.” 

Aziraphale looked down. “I, I don’t know what to say.” 

“If loving you is really all it takes to die, then I should have been dead years ago. You deserve to be loved, and held, and touched kindly just like everyone else.” 

“I’m not sure if I believe that. After everything I’ve done…”

Crowley pulled him back into a hug. “I know, Aziraphale. Let me show you. Please? Let’s work through this together. We have the rest of eternity now, by ourselves. Let’s figure this out together.” 

Aziraphale took a deep breath. “I’m not going to be better by tomorrow.” 

“I know, angel. I Fell six thousand years ago and I’m still dealing with it. But please, you don’t have to shut yourself off like this. Please let me love you.” 

“You won’t go too fast?” 

Crowley smiled. “I promise. I will slow down if you ask. Except in the Bentley. It is perfectly safe to do ninety miles an hour in Central London.” 

Aziraphale laughed. It was a wet laugh, but it was genuine happiness. This wasn’t going to be solved in a day, or even a week. Crowley knew this. Still, things could get better. They both deserved to get better. And Aziraphale did deserve all of the love in the world. Crowley would do his best to give it to him. After all, they were on their own side now.


End file.
